How it’s New York: The Chieftains play New Jersey, at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, on 
Sunday, March 5, with special guests Natalie MacMaster and Donnell Leahy. The night before, Saturday, March 4, they play Queen’s College, the Kupferberg Center, in Flushing, NY. Paddy’s daughter Aedin Moloney is a New York actress, who runs the company Fallen Angels.
How it’s Irish: Um… it’s The Chieftains…
I’ve talked to Paddy Moloney several times and it’s always a treat… he tells stories, laughs at his own jokes, and even sings!
In the brand spanking new paper The Montclair Local I wrote up an interview with him, in honor of his playing at NJPAC this Sunday. Here are a few grafs from that piece… catch the rest here!
We have more to share with you from Paddy and hope to get up another piece, or even a podcast, in the coming weeks!
On a distant planet, somewhere, someone may be listening to the the uillean (pronounced “illin”) pipes, accompanied by the insistent sound of the goat-skin drum the bodhrán (“bahran”), and believe it to be the music of Earth. Astronauts Cady Coleman and Commander Chris Hadfield have played the music of The Chieftains in space. To those of us on Earth, the sound of The Chieftains, a band that turns 55 this year, is the sound of Irish music.
It’s a bit longer than that, really, according to bandleader and piper Paddy Moloney, 78. He says they began playing together in the late 1950s. The Chieftains have won six Grammy awards, an Academy award for their contribution to the 1975 film “Barry Lyndon,” and performed with a wide variety of artists, including Luciano Pavarotti, Mick Jagger, Lyle Lovett, Van Morrison and Rosanne Cash.
“The first time I played [at NJPAC], I couldn’t believe it. It had that warmth. It was terrific. We always come up with a few surprises to make it different from the previous time,” said Moloney, from his home in Ireland.
One of the new offerings this year will be a short film clip at the beginning of the concert, which provides a retrospective of the band’s 55-year history. “It goes back to 1962. Would you believe it,” Moloney said with a laugh.”
Read the rest of the article HERE.
The Chieftains with special guests Natalie MacMaster and Donnell Leahy, Sunday, March 5, 3 p.m. at NJPAC’s Prudential Hall, One Center St., Newark
Visit www.njpac.org or call 888-go-njpac for tickets.
